I feel quite sure that I have neurotically blogged everything beyond the most fleeting of encounters with attractive women I’ve met over the past few months. Some, as I recall, passed on the “met” criteria due to the hazy space of emotional connection via interweb. Conspicuous in absence is B__, who I met for beers this week after trading a few messages online. I had a great time, and the nearly four hours we spent drinking went by like no time at all.
I find myself needing to justify not having told you about her, and simultaneously don’t want to make a big deal out of it. It was a busy week. It’s not like I went out of my way to hide meeting her – I told a friend or two. Perhaps it was because I’ve had similar entertaining evenings with others, and I felt like they went nowhere fast. What observation (other than the recurring pattern) could possibly be article-worthy? If you’ve been reading along, I can only assume you’ve occasionally noticed a theme and thought, I get it already.
So, last night we met up again, and I pushed my luck and doubled-down with a dinner invite. There’s a new place we wanted to try, but it was closed, so we rode together to a favorite “local” vegetarian place. The service was way off, but the food impeccable as always. If we hadn’t been so hungry, we might not have noticed the food not showing up; once again, we were so engrossed in conversation.
We met up with her friends at the bar I’ve been haunting. Apparently, that’s her neighborhood bar, but I can’t say I remember ever seeing her. The bar was having its St Patrick’s Day blowout on Friday since the holiday falls on Wednesday this year. (What a joke, that place will be a mad-house the day-of and they know it.) So there was some live music (which I’ve never seen there before). There was a local college game on (which B__ was actually into because she’s in grad school there). It was Friday at L__. The place was pretty loud. The group chatted a bit over the noise, but B__ and I made eyes at each other across the table and leaned in close to hear what the other was saying.
The weather had turned suddenly Spring the day of our first date. It was a weeknight, but I tried to get her to walk around downtown with me in the night air. She had to be up at 6 or 7 and it was midnight. “One hour,” I said. She said she’d really love to, but shouldn’t/couldn’t, and I could tell from her smile she was genuinely conflicted. “Half an hour,” I counter-offered. It was no good, but again, her smile gave me a little tickle inside and the effort didn’t seem in the least wasted.
The anchor couple of her group are married and turn in early. The party broke up around midnight when the game and music ended. B__ asked if I wanted to walk around, and I agreed as quickly as she could ask. We decided to tour my studio (and you can bet your sweet ass I had ulterior motives). I showed her around and she ooed and aahed at all the right times. I was having trouble making a move even though I knew I probably wouldn’t be rebuffed. It was around that time we noticed it was raining, kind of hard.
We sat down to check the weather report via iPhone, and I scooted over to give her room beside me. She was practically in my arms before we’d even found out how long the storm was likely to last.
Time dilated again, but around two hours later when we decided to make our way back to our cars, it was still raining. She was wearing delicious, swede boots and was worried they’d never be the same. I assumed this was going to turn into a cab ride, but the next thing I knew, she was seriously considering going barefoot for the five blocks back to the parking deck.
We scavenged a couple umbrellas and off we went. She’d worn a lovely floral dress, and as hot as it’d been with the boots, it was that much hotter without them. I’ve walked that route a hundred times now, and noticed how different it is at night than during the day, in the rain versus the sunshine. With someone else versus alone. I have now experienced rain, at night, with someone, but I can only imagine how it would be without shoes.
I should’ve taken mine off too.